


into the light of the dark black night

by karasgotagun (jazzmckay)



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Bodysharing, Dirty Bomb Ending (Detroit: Become Human), Family, Gen, Guilt, Happy Ending, Human Alice Williams (Detroit: Become Human), Past Child Abuse, Violent Android Revolution (Detroit: Become Human)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:33:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26932186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jazzmckay/pseuds/karasgotagun
Summary: Fifteen years after Markus detonated the dirty bomb, Kara and Luther's bodies are breaking down without thirium or replacement parts to repair them.Unwilling to let them waste away, Alice returns to the radiation-filled city of Detroit to find help.
Relationships: Kara & Luther & Alice Williams (Detroit: Become Human), Markus & North (Detroit: Become Human)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 28





	into the light of the dark black night

**Author's Note:**

> big thanks to my amazing beta, [RonnieSilverlake!](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RonnieSilverlake) <3

The automatic doors part with a gust of autumn wind that swirls around her as she steps into the building.

“Good morning, ma’am. Is there anything I can help you with today?”

“No, thank you,” she says, offering a polite smile as she raises her hand, waving a keyring looped over her index finger. “I’m just here to pick things up.”

“Of course. I’ll be here if you need anything.”

The rows of P.O. boxes have become so familiar over the last few weeks that she barely needs to look at the number plates to find her own. Seven aisles down, about a third of the way in. She inserts the key, waits half a second for the chip to be verified, and then pulls the door open.

Inside is exactly what she was hoping to see. One small, square case and a larger box that’s sealed with a lot of tape, the word “fragile” stamped in large, block letters across the side. The small case fits into the large pocket of her jacket and she tucks the second package under her arm, holding it secure in a firm grip.

The receptionist tells her to have a nice day when she walks past again, and she responds in kind before stepping through the glass doors into the bustle of the city’s streets.

It’s a sunny Saturday morning and the sidewalks are crowded. After a moment of internal debating, she decides she’s willing to stand in line for a coffee at the Tim’s on the corner. The stuff she has at home is more likely to make her jittery, and she will want steady hands for her afternoon project.

The place is packed—the line extends into the entranceway and most of the tables are already claimed. On a suspended television screen in the corner, a table of news anchors are in discussion, their voices muffled by the coffeeshop chatter, forcing her to strain her ears.

“With the fifteenth anniversary quickly approaching, it’s at the forefront of everyone’s mind again,” one says. “The closer we get to the city being hospitable to humans, the more people start to demand action.”

“Oh, absolutely. We’ve waited a decade and a half! There’s been no progress—the world has been forced to abide by a hostile faction just waiting, right in our midst. Something needs to be done. Something needed to be done years ago.”

Others are watching the broadcast, too. At one table, a woman clenches her jaw and pointedly turns her face away from the screen. A man swallows thickly, gloved hands clenched tight around his coffee. A teenager gazes up at the display with a furrowed brow, neither angry nor scared, just curious.

“The problem is a lack of resources,” a third anchor interjects. “Radiation protection for an entire army is no small thing.”

“So send in drones. Learn from the surveillance bots that got destroyed on the perimeter and build something stronger, something that does more than just gather intel.”

One of the others scoffs before responding. “That’s the exact line of thinking that got us into this war in the first place. Make machines to do our dirty work. Make them stronger, more versatile… humanity already learned a lesson about effective machines.”

“I’m not talking about artificial intelligence, here, just—”

“Can I help who’s next?”

The news broadcast fades into the background as she steps up to the counter to make her order, welcoming the distraction. She blocks the discussion from her mind, instead focusing on getting a hot cup of coffee to ward off the seasonal chill as she thinks over her plans for the rest of the day.

Half an hour later, she’s back at home, doing a balancing act to get inside without dropping her package or spilling her drink. Once inside, she kicks off her boots and goes down the hall to take the stairs into her basement lab.

She hums a little tune to herself as she sips her coffee and sets her packages down on her desk. Her attention goes to the small case first. After flipping her lamp on, she breaks the seal of the case and pulls out its contents.

The device looks like a wrist watch. A blank screen embedded in a circular disk, attached to a strap that she intends to fasten to her travel backpack. There are instructions in the case, but the device is self explanatory; she thumbs the button on the side and the screen flashes to life. Green light, all clear. Safe.

She puts the Geiger counter into the drawer of her desk, underneath a stack of paper. It’s the last item on her list: she has a protective suit with an air filtration mask, first aid, iodine solution... She has everything she can conceive of needing.

Next to her desk, her work lab coat is hanging from a hook. She pulls it on and then steps up to the worktable in the center of the room. This is where she opens the package of fragile items, arranging them in safe positions around her work space.

Just as she’s flipping the switch on her burner element, she hears footsteps in the hallway upstairs. It can only be her dad.

“Alice? Thought I heard you coming in.”

Looking up from her work station, Alice sees Luther descending the steps into the basement.

“Hi, dad. Sorry, I was eager to get started. I have what we need to get mom awake again.”

Luther makes his way over to her, his movements slow and stuttered. It won’t be long before he has hardware issues of his own to troubleshoot. He leans over her and presses a kiss to the top of her head, giving her braided hair a teasing tug.

“Do you need a hand?” he asks.

Alice kicks her leg out to hook her ankle around the rung of a nearby stool and brings it closer. “I’m good, but you don’t have to go. Give me less than an hour and we can go check on mom together.”

Luther sits down next to her, a gentle smile warming his face. He picks up her safety goggles and hands them over to her.

Smiling in return, Alice puts them on and then sets to work. Luther watches her measure out what she needs and mix it all together in turn, letting her concentrate but keeping her company.

This is far from the first time Alice has made her own batch of thirium. It took some ingenuity and reverse engineering, with CyberLife patents keeping the exact formula a mystery from the public. After the way everything went down all those years ago, CyberLife exists in a state of stasis, their secrets tied up in secure databases, hosted in a secluded city.

But they make do. As promised, it isn’t long before she’s placing the homemade mixture aside to settle and cool, cleaning up her station while they wait.

“Alice.”

Alice hangs up her lab coat before approaching her father.

He pulls her into a hug. “I love you, little one.”

“I love you, too,” Alice says as she presses her face into Luther’s chest, sagging into his hold. No matter how big she gets, she still feels enveloped by his hugs, safe in his arms.

“Let’s go see your mother.”

They pull apart. Alice grabs what she needs and Luther directs her forward to take the stairs ahead of him. Together, they go to the bedroom where Kara has been locked in stasis for over a week now. Luther has spent a lot of time by her side, but Alice has been scarce; she knows android functions well and knows that they don’t need to breathe, but she still doesn’t like to see her parents so motionless. Instead, she applied herself to making sure her mom would get the chance to be active again.

While Alice prepares a syringe of thirium, Luther opens the panel over Kara’s forearm and eases her primary vein out of the connector port with practiced ease, not a single drop spilled.

Alice sits down on the mattress by her mother’s hip, accepts the thirium wire, and begins to pump the fresh batch into her system.

Luther circles the bed to sit on the opposite side, taking Kara’s hand into both of his own.

It takes three syringe refills for Kara’s respiratory system to start simulating again, and another two after that for Kara’s fingers to curl as one, hooking around Luther’s.

“There she is,” Luther says. His body relaxes like an enormous weight has been lifted from his shoulders. “You did it, Alice. As always.”

Alice reconnects Kara’s wire and pulls her arm plate back into position. When she looks up, she catches the sight of Kara’s eyes fluttering open, landing on her own.

A smile spreads across Kara’s face as she lifts her hand, cupping Alice’s cheek.

“I missed you,” Alice says.

Tears spring to her eyes—in an instant, all the fear and worry she has kept under the surface starts to overflow. Every time this happens, it scares her. She wonders if each time will be the last time. Someday she won’t be able to access all the pieces she needs, or she won’t be able to act fast enough, or Kara’s body will be so out of date that it’ll stop responding no matter how close Alice’s homebrew is to the real thing.

Kara moves her hand to the back of Alice’s neck to draw her close, pulling her down onto her arms, the two of them slotted together. “It’s okay, I’m here. I’m here.”

One day, she will no longer be here. Alice isn’t ready for that day, and in the last couple of years, she has felt that day approaching too fast.

Kara kisses her temple. “Thank you for everything you’ve done for us.”

“It's what we do,” Alice murmurs into her shoulder. “We look after each other.”

If not for Kara, Alice wouldn’t have made it out of Detroit alive. Kara did what she had to do to keep Alice safe during those harrowing but freeing days after they ran away.

Alice is going to live up to her example.

For the rest of the weekend, she sticks close to home. She enjoys the company of her parents, watches the way they orbit each other with such ease after all these years.

She imagines them getting to live a human’s lifespan together.

She wonders how the androids of Detroit are faring.

On Sunday night, she goes to bed at her usual time. After she closes the door behind her, she sits in the chair by her window with a sheet of paper and a pen. She writes a letter. She makes reassurances and a promise.

In the morning, she won’t be heading to work. She’ll be hitting the road.

* * *

When the cracked and overgrown highway turns to quiet city roads, she meets her first obstacle. On one side of the road, the line of abandoned vehicles points away from the city, and on the other, more are turned sideways, creating a deliberate barrier and a clear message. No entry beyond this point.

She brings her car to a stop, gears up, and continues on foot.

No human has walked this path in a long time. She doesn’t know what to expect, but she also knows that she’s not going to give up. She reaches for the thin chain around her neck, tangling it around her gloved fingers and catching hold of the two small circles that hang off the end. Both of them are dark—disconnected from their hosts and inert—as they have been for fifteen years.

The streets remain empty save for rubble. She spots the occasional broken drone, little surveillance machines that reportedly never made it far before hitting a field of disruption. Other than that: nothing. The only sound she can hear is the soft, steady purr of her helmet’s air filtration unit.

A feeling of unease settles in Alice’s bones as she continues through the streets. Everything is deserted and overgrown, but she still feels like she’s being watched, like there are people hidden in the mouths of alleyways, obscured in shadows, peering out through the grimy shopfront windows, only to sidestep out of view as soon as she turns to look.

“Get it together,” she whispers to herself.

Even at a murmur, her voice feels too loud, like a beacon for danger, but she hasn’t come this far just to turn around when she’s a couple hours walk from where she expects to find someone who can help her.

CyberLife Tower still stretches tall above Detroit’s skyline. The landmark of Belle Isle helps her navigate a city that is no longer familiar to her. She remembers pockets of time and space, little places Kara and Luther found to keep her safe for the night. She remembers the bus, and long, snowy roads. She remembers the brightly-lit carousel, and the pier, where she and Kara lay on the cold ground and pretended to be dead as soldiers with rifles passed by, searching for resistance.

The desolation is so absolute that when a flash of unexpected blue crosses her line of sight, she startles hard with a flinch and a gasp. It isn’t until she has tilted herself sideways and squared her feet that she realises there’s nothing to fear—it’s just a bird, now perched on a rusty street sign. A blue jay, its tail feathers long and vibrant.

It swivels its head, inspecting her. She relaxes, lifting a gloved hand.

The bird considers her from a moment, then takes off into the air, circling around her once before bringing itself down onto her extended finger.

“Hi there. Ever seen a human before?”

The blue jay pecks at her wrist, curious rather than vicious. She can barely feel it through the thick protective material of her suit.

“Back home, there’s a crow that sits at the corner of the street, up on the powerline. I’ve never gotten it to come close, but it caws back when I say ‘hello’.”

With a flutter, the blue jay rises back into the air, only to take a new place on her shoulder.

“I’m looking for the androids who live here,” she says as she starts to walk down the center of the street again, eyes back to roaming over the empty windows of stores and complexes. “I thought I would have run into someone by now. They can’t have all deactivated, can they?”

When she finally comes face to face with one of Detroit’s androids, she’ll need to be on her guard, but this barrenness is leaving her equally unsure of what she’s going to find.

The blue jay stays on her shoulder for another couple of minutes but soon grows bored with her slow pace through the city, taking to the sky once again, though it doesn’t stray far. As Alice makes her way across the dead, hazy city, it flies above her, perching on street lamps and power lines until she’s made enough progress to catch up.

The path to Jericho becomes familiar at the outskirts of Ferndale. Alice finally gets the sense of déjà vu she has been expecting, almost able to envision snow falling through the sky, crunching under her boots, making her shiver. Luther picking her up and cradling her close to warm her as Kara leads them to the fabled safe haven.

Alice still doesn’t catch sight of any androids, even this close to the place they first called home. The pier stretches out between her and the derelict ship, as abandoned as everywhere else.

The blue jay whistles overheard and swoops low, circling around Alice before reclaiming its spot on her shoulder.

“Doesn’t look like anyone’s home,” Alice says.

The only response she gets from the bird is the bobbing of its head.

It won’t take long to look the ship over just in case—two thirds of the structure are completely underwater from the explosion, leaving only the topmost levels accessible. Alice walks past the old, rusted gangplank that has fallen into the water and approaches the second-best way on board: steel panelling from the side of the ship that has torn away from the hull and fallen against the pier.

“Alright…” Alice mutters to herself, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “I can do this.”

The blue jay takes to the air again as she pulls herself up onto the edge of the thick metal sheeting and starts easing down the slope of it.

The panel groans under her weight, shifting an inch before going steady against its constraints again. Dirt and rust crumbles down the angle, disturbed for the first time in years.

Just before she reaches the top of the water, she makes a jump for a beam that’s still curved to the shape of the hull, holding strong while the rest around it has eroded. From there, she heaves herself up to the railing, swinging herself over onto the deck.

“Hello?” Alice calls as she walks across the surface of the ship.

There are unseen bodies under her feet, she knows. Androids who died in the explosion, androids who were shot down by the FBI and the military, androids who never made it off the ship.

Alice stops, becoming rooted in place, and wraps her arms around herself. She wonders if the FBI considered that there might be humans among the androids in Jericho, or if they didn’t care either way.

Kara and Luther didn’t let anything happen to her, didn’t let her come into harm.

The ship’s tilted axis makes the steps below deck difficult to traverse—parts of the polished wood have caved in, leaving gaps that darken into nothingness. The further she descends, the more her footsteps echo through the empty metal halls, the less daylight remains to guide her.

The blue jay doesn’t follow, and she’s alone.

Alice walks through the ship with a hand out against the wall to keep her balance. There are no bodies, yet, and she suspects those who survived the final fight must have retrieved those they could. The blue blood has long since gone invisible to her eyes.

A low murmur ahead.

With a jolt, Alice pushes flat into the wall and goes motionless, breath caught and heart hammering in her chest.

There are no footsteps coming closer, no clamour of alerted voices, just the faint sound of someone speaking evenly. Alice can’t make out the words, doesn’t hear a return voice.

They don’t sound dangerous; they sound like someone who might be able to help her. Help her mom and dad.

Carefully, Alice steps away from the wall, continuing on.

The voice gets louder as she advances, a constant drone of one person speaking almost under their breath, the sound amplified from the echoey metal walls instead of intentional projection.

“No, no, this can’t be it, can it? What if there could be more?”

A pause.

“You don’t know that.”

Alice hears a thud, like something dull hitting metal.

“They want an answer soon, and I just… I just don’t know. I’m honestly surprised they still…

“Hm? No, it’s not that simple, is it? Not after what I did.”

Pushing through her trepidation, Alice rounds the corner into a control room full of machinery that has been dead for years, since before the revolution. A blue glow spreads from the center of the room, casting dark shadows off the consoles and equipment.

“Hello?” Alice calls again.

The voice stops.

Alice swallows thickly as she steps properly into the room, around a tower of environment scanners and seeking the origin point of the blue light.

Huddled in the middle of the room is an android, wreathed equally in light and darkness, whole body pulsing like a network of electrodes. Wires pour out of every limb, falling out the back of his skull and feeding into various parts of his torso, stringing his arms up in front of the main console like a marionette.

One eye is bright, luminescent blue, and the other is muted, colour impossible to make out, but Alice is certain that it’s green.

“Who’s that?” Markus asks.

His head snaps to the left, looking at something Alice can’t see.

“Are you sure? How is that… how is that possible?”

“Markus,” Alice says as she takes a cautious step forward. “What happened to you?”

“To me?” Markus repeats incredulously. He scoffs. “To me, she asks.”

Now, he turns to the right, pausing. Listening to someone who isn’t there.

“No, I don’t think so,” he says.

Alice crouches down in front of him, minding the cables that are strewn across the floor. “Hey, can we talk?”

Markus focuses on her again, his blue eye lighting up, the iris spinning. “I’m good at talking.”

“Yeah,” Alice says, torn between awed and crestfallen as she takes in the sight of the once-proud leader of androids, now alone in shambles. “I don’t remember every detail from back then, but I do remember how you spoke. You could command a room at the drop of a hat.”

The blue light in the room flickers as the exposed processor in his skull works, knobs lighting up and going dark in turn.

“I don’t remember you,” Markus says flatly. “But Lucy does.”

Instinctively, Alice glances around the room, but the two of them are still the only ones present. She takes a chance, gesturing to Markus’ left. “Lucy?”

He nods, the motion causing a knot of wires to pulse with light.

“I remember her, too.” She and Kara met briefly, and Kara speaks well of her. “What’s she saying?”

Markus sighs, shutting his eyes, which dims the light by a fraction. “We’re debating next steps. Do you know the half life of radioactive cobalt? Do you know how quickly and how slowly the whole world can change? Do you know how far is too far?”

Of all the ramblings she has overheard, these make the most sense, and the truth isn’t kind. “I… don’t know if it will ever be possible to come back from this, Markus.”

Shoulders hunching, Markus curls into himself, cables writhing. “I don’t know what came over me, how I could do that,” he whispers. “It was monstrous… it was—”

Alice reaches for him, curling her gloved hand around his arm. It soothes him minimally, but does cut off his guilty diatribe.

He won’t be able to help her. The years and the horror of the choice he made have impacted him too strongly, leaving him to fall apart just as the ship falls apart around him. To find help, Alice needs to find someone who has merely adapted to the new state of Detroit, not someone who was the cause of it.

“Can you tell me where the others are?” Alice asks.

Markus opens his eyes, looking to the right. He waves his hand, pulling at the wires connecting him to the machine at his back. “Simon.”

“No, I mean…” Alice winces behind her breathing mask. “Others who are alive. Have their own bodies.”

The look Markus levels her with is pointed and heavy, yet dull. “Not mutually exclusive. They’re alive, I just have to… they’re alive as long as I stay connected.”

“Right, I’m sorry. What about North? Where is North?”

“North,” Markus breathes, voice weak and staticky. “Yes, you need to go to North, she’s in charge now, really. She’s the one who… kept going.”

Alice nods encouragingly. “Where can I find her?”

Markus furrows his brow in thought. “I don’t know. The tower?”

“CyberLife Tower?”

“Not anymore. Yes.”

“Alright.”

Alice eases away from him, standing back up. His eyes follow her as she moves, but he doesn’t stop her, physically or verbally.

“Are you… going to be okay, here?”

With a shrug, Markus drops his eyes, going unfocused. “‘Okay’ is relative.”

It was a stupid question, Alice thinks. There’s nothing okay about Detroit, and nothing okay about Markus, but there isn’t much to be done about it. As sorry as she is to say it, Alice needs to think of her parents and get back on track to her objective.

“Bye, Markus,” she whispers, unsure if he’ll even hear it through the muffle of her helmet.

He does. “Bye, Alice. Give Kara my regards.”

In that one moment, he seems almost lucid, in command, but the moment passes and his head lolls back into the console he’s hooked up to. He looks dead without simulated breathing active to make his chest rise and fall, without the attentiveness of his gaze.

Alice steps around the glowing cables, heading for the door.

Markus resumes speaking, not to her, but to ghosts.

“Not a good indication,” he says. “I wish I could believe you, but…”

He goes quiet, leaving only the sound of Alice’s receding footsteps, and when he finally continues, Alice is almost too far to hear it properly.

“Hope? What good did hope ever do for me?”

Alice hears no more from him. She ascends up to the deck, whole body trembling from the encounter. The leader of the android movement is little more than a shadow cast over a tomb of the dead.

Someone is waiting for her at the stern of the ship.

Even with the way his chassis has changed, Alice recognises the deviant hunter. He’s wearing a combat vest, but his arms are bare, right down to the black armoured plating. Skin is still active over his face, but like Markus, the back of his skull has been opened to allow room for additional hardware. Not one but three processors are blinking and flashing in an interconnected bundle, casting a blue halo around his head. His eyes lock on hers through the transparent visor of her helmet. One is a piercing grey, the other a warm hazel.

On his shoulder sits the blue jay. The hunter whistles and the bird takes off, doing a spin around the two of them before flying away back into the desolate city.

“Alice Williams, isn’t it?” the deviant hunter asks.

“That’s right.”

He gestures to the side of the ship, where a length of plywood has been placed to bridge the gap between the deck and the pier. “Come with us.”

Alice raises her eyebrows, hesitant. “And go where exactly?”

One of the processors flashes and his body goes lax. “You were looking for us, weren’t you? Well, you found us.” He does a loose flourish with his arms, a facsimile of a courtesy. “We’ll get you where you need to be.”

The last time they laid eyes on each other, it was from opposite sides of the freeway, but there aren't any sides anymore. If the deviant hunter is active after all these years and holds authority without Markus’ deactivation preceding it, then he must be working with North and the others.

Again, the processors blink, and he steps forward with calm, non-threatening steps.

“It isn’t safe to be aboard Jericho anymore. You shouldn’t have come this far.”

“Markus is here,” Alice points out.

The hunter turns, bowing his head mournfully. “Markus refuses to leave the ship, and he is beyond help. He can call for us if he changes his mind.”

Alice closes the distance between them, choosing to trust. She isn’t a scared child anymore, and he is much more than a machine.

“What do I call you?”

“Connor will suffice,” he answers as he escorts her off the ship. “We can talk about telling the difference between me, Sixty, and Nines if you’re in Detroit long enough for it to matter.”

With a different inflection, he adds, “Now that Connor has brought it up, how long _will_ you be staying?”

“Only long enough to get some answers. And whatever updated tech you’re willing to part with.”

At the end of the pier, another android is sitting at the wheel of an idling military truck, appropriated from the forces that tried to shut the androids down fifteen years ago. She glances in their direction as they approach, and Alice sees that she’s a Chloe android, blond hair flowing from her unmodified skull.

“That may not be possible,” Connor says in a flat tone.

He rests a hand on Alice’s shoulder, directing her to the back of the truck’s open bed.

Alice shakes him off and climbs up on her own. “It’s not for me, it’s for my parents. At least one of you remembers Kara.”

Connor follows her into the truck, sitting on the bench across from her. He reaches over the side and bangs his hand against the metal, signalling that they’re ready to go.

The truck rolls forward, slowly gathering speed as they take the road away from the docks.

“I do,” Connor says. “She’s still active?”

“Barely.”

Connor nods. “I understand. It’s impressive that she made it this far. Your doing?”

“I went into engineering. I’m no Kamski, but…”

“But you must be doing something right.”

“I’m doing everything I can.”

The empty streets of Ferndale fill out around them, the truck bumping over cracked asphalt roads. Having two travel companions makes the journey a little less unnerving, a little less like walking through a graveyard.

The day is drawing to a close, sun dipping low over the horizon, and Alice is surprised when street lamps switch on the closer they are to downtown. Even more than that, the People Mover flies by, loud enough in the surrounding quiet that Alice jumps.

Signs of life, however minimal. “I didn’t see anyone on the way in,” Alice says.

“Of course you didn’t, you put us into a state of emergency.”

She blinks, eyes going wide. “I did?”

“You’re the first human to make it past the perimeter in over a decade, and only because we let you. We have protocols, though this is the first time we’ve needed to use them.”

Since flying away at Connor’s command, the blue jay has not returned. “The bird is an android, isn’t it?”

Connor grins. “A sentry. Subtlety has its merits.”

Better to be monitored by a bird than to face whatever took down all the drones that lie in pieces around the city.

“How many androids are still living here?” she asks, amazed that such a population could hide so thoroughly.

“You must understand that we can’t give away that information,” one of the Connors snaps. Another adds, softer, “There are more of us than chassis to accommodate, so it’s hard to say. Most of us became a collective before we had time to invent workarounds for our degrading bodies and the dwindling supply of thirium.

“Which is what you’re after, isn’t it? Hoping we have a better solution to your problem?”

“Sounds to me like I didn’t misplace my faith.”

Connor leans forward, elbows on his knees, and grins in a way that shows too many teeth. “Assuming we let you take our tech out of our city. Don’t have ulterior motives, do you?”

“Absolutely not,” Alice answers. “If you thought I meant harm, you would have given me a much different welcome.”

“You’ve been granted safe passage for now, but one wrong move… well, no other human has made it this far, have they?”

Alice mirrors Connor’s stance, putting them on the same level, looking him straight in the eye through the glare of her helmet visor. “I want my parents to live full lives. Nothing more, nothing less.”

Connor considers her, mulling over her declaration. With a roll of his eyes, he backs out of his intimidation demeanour. “How sentimental. Fine.”

They switch control, processors blinking, and Connor gives her an apologetic half-smile. “Ultimately, the decision lies with North, but I’m willing to put in a good word.”

Alice nods. At least one or two of them seem to believe and trust her. “Thanks.”

Chloe brings them to the edge of Detroit’s mainland, CyberLife Tower growing larger and taller until they reach the checkpoint bridge. It’s only partially lit up, little pockets of blue and white shining through the darkness. The lettering that used to hang over the entrance has been removed, no longer labelling it the property of CyberLife.

There are armed androids at the final checkpoint, but they don’t force the truck to a stop, just watch curiously as Alice and her companions pass by, pulling into the lot in front of the tower.

In the lobby, the Chloe who drove them stops in her tracks as another proceeds across the lobby floor to greet them.

“North is upstairs,” the second Chloe says with a pleasant smile. “I’ll take you to her office.”

She leads them to the elevator while the other parts ways with them, back outside to return to her patrol.

Connor stays by Alice’s side, walking with his head held high and his hands clasped at the small of his back. All three of them take the elevator to the very top floor and cross a lobby into the office of CyberLife’s former CEO. With Connor on her left and Chloe on her right, Alice beholds the leader of the androids.

At the windows looking over the city, North stands in wait. She’s dressed in much the same way Connor is, parts of her skin deactivated and two long pieces of plating removed from her skull, leaving her hair in a long strip down the middle. There isn’t space for more processors, but there are lines of external data drives hooked into her system, as well as another fixed to the port at the back of her neck.

Alice watches the reflection of her face move on the window pane as she speaks.

“After the last original residents of Detroit died of radiation poisoning, I never thought I’d lay eyes on a human again. I never thought one would have the guts to walk right in, alone, no army at her back.”

She turns to face Alice head-on. “Tell me why you’re here, and don’t lie to me.”

Alice steps closer, unimpeded by either Connor or Chloe.

“That night, my parents and I escaped to Canada. I don’t know how aware you are of what happened around the rest of the world, but all android manufacturing was put on halt and technologies derived from CyberLife blueprints were met with suspicion. Replacement parts and compatible thirium became harder and harder to come by.

“Kara and Luther are dying. I do what I can with the materials I get my hands on, but it isn’t enough. At this rate… I can only give them a couple more years.”

North regards her with a closed expression. “They should have returned here themselves. This is where they belong.”

Alice sneers before she can stop herself. “That isn’t your decision to make.”

There’s a beat of silence between them, North raising an eyebrow at her.

Feeling tested, Alice continues. “This isn’t home for all androids. They chose something else, they chose to live a different life, and they deserve to have that as long as possible. If you aren’t going to help me, I’ll find a different solution.”

North huffs a dismissive breath. “A human this full of indignation for a couple of androids? Unheard of.”

“How would you know?” Alice throws her hands out at her sides. “Has any of this made it possible for you to know what bonds a human and an android can form?”

“Watch it,” North snarls.

She stalks around the desk, coming to stand directly in front of Alice. Despite not matching Alice’s height, she makes an imposing figure with her fiery eyes and an air of authority.

“Markus did what he felt necessary to protect us from the human threat,” she says. “He wanted it to go differently, and he tried—at great cost. In the end, he saw that we would never be allowed our freedom without force.”

Alice shakes her head. “Markus is hidden in the depths of a half-sunken ship, talking nonsense to ghosts because he can’t reconcile the choice he made.”

“Yes, well. He wasn’t strong enough to shoulder what was necessary.” North casts her gaze aside, upper lip jerking in frustration. “What’s done is done. He won’t find comfort in the past.”

Acid burns in the back of Alice’s throat—she swallows around the urge to throw up. She didn’t come here to debate what happened or theorise about what could have been. “Are you going to help me or not?”

“I am not.”

“North.”

Alice looks over her shoulder at Connor, whose face has fallen into a frown, his eyes sad. “We believe her. We saw them, fifteen years ago. Alice being here now is not unlike the lengths Kara went to back then to keep her safe. They’re family, and we can spare two sets of upgrades.”

“It’s a risk—”

“Not everything is a battle, North. Not everything is life or death, and not all humans came to hate androids for evolving.”

He gestures to the right and they all turn to Chloe.

She has a portrait projected over her palm. With her other hand, she brushes her thumb over the image, causing it to flicker around the disturbance and reform when she pulls away.

It’s Elijah Kamski, long hair loose around his shoulders and a smile on his face, looking far more personable than he ever did while speaking with reporters and doing press releases. He’s someone only the original Chloe ever knew in earnest.

He has surely been dead for fifteen years.

North purses her lips, looking the opposite of swayed. “My answer is no. Chloe, please escort Alice to the perimeter. I want to speak with Connor, Sixty, and Nines.”

Closing her hand into a fist, Chloe dispels the image from her palm.

The word ‘no’ echoes in Alice’s mind, harsh and definitive. One word that puts an end to her quest, makes all her preparations a waste, makes her trip to the irradiated city nothing but an unnecessary danger.

And it means her parents are going to die. They’ll go to sleep one last time and Alice won’t know how to wake them back up again, all because she can’t convince North that she’s telling the truth, that she has no bad intentions.

A hand grasps at her shoulder and turns her towards the door, guiding her along while her mind is stuck on the fact that she has failed.

Connor joins North as Chloe leads Alice out of the office, away from her parents’ last chance of survival.

“Did you see Markus?” North asks.

“We didn’t, but Alice confirmed that he’s still aboard Jericho.”

North sighs and brings a hand up to her face, pressing tense fingers to the spot where her LED used to be connected. By the time she replies, Alice and Chloe are too out of range to hear it.

The elevator doors close with a clang, making Alice jump. It’s just her and Chloe in the small space.

“I’m sorry,” Chloe says softly, genuine.

This can’t be the end. North doesn’t trust humans—can’t trust humans—but Alice has her foot in the door. The androids let her into the city, let her approach Markus, let her into the tower. She just needs to push a little harder.

In a rush, Alice presses the emergency stop button, bringing the elevator to a halt, and pivots to address Chloe head on. “You believe me, don’t you? Can you help me?”

Chloe threads her fingers together, wringing them. “I don’t know what else I can do. Our memories are long, which means our fear and distrust are lasting.”

“Kara and Luther didn’t have anything to do with what happened,” Alice insists, fingers finding the chain around her neck to brush over the old LEDs that hang there. “All we wanted was to get somewhere safe.”

“I know, North would never intentionally leave them to die, she’s just—she won’t take your word for it. North wants to protect us for as long as she’s able, which won’t be forever. As long as the military sends drones, we can turn them back, but eventually the radiation will dissipate enough to allow ground troops into the city, and we don’t have the individual units to go up against an army. We need time and secrecy to decide what we will do when that day comes. We need time to prepare for it. North is overcautious with our new technology, but for a reason.”

Objectively, Alice gets it.

Markus committed an atrocity when backed into a corner, no options left but to die or make a monster of himself and live with the consequences. North is doing all she can to make the death and pain and horror mean something. It will never be worth it—but North has inherited a storm she wants her people to weather.

Alice steps closer, lifting a hand to grasp Chloe’s shoulder. “I understand, I do. But I’m not a threat. I can help.”

The smile she gets is sad. “I wish that were true.”

An idea is forming in her mind, bringing forth the only way she might make North trust her. “I’ll try. Can you give me that chance?” she asks. “I just need you to take me to Jericho instead of the perimeter.”

Chloe blinks at her. “Back to the ship? There’s hardly anything left of it. Most of the equipment they had on board is underwater now.”

“I’m not after the equipment. I’m after Markus. He’s what’s important to North.”

“Oh.” Chloe tilts her head in thought. “Yes, you’re right. Markus is… difficult to talk to, though. Neither North nor Connor have managed.”

“I know, but I have to try, Chloe. For my mom and dad.”

With that, Chloe relents. She presses two fingers to the elevator buttons to put it into motion again, carrying them down the tower to ground level. “Okay. There’s no harm in trying.”

Alice smiles, grateful to have one last chance. “Thank you.”

Chloe just nods, going silent as the elevator arrives at the atrium, taking on the air of Alice’s escort while they cross the floor. Once again, she switches off with another model in the lobby, but there’s a look in the new model’s eyes that says she is of one mind with the unit that stays in the tower.

She still doesn’t speak until they’re in the truck, pulling through the first checkpoint.

“You’ll need this if you’re going to separate Markus from Jericho.” She removes a small metal case from her vest pocket. “He’ll lose data if he doesn’t connect to our network.”

Alice pops the clasp of the box to find a small computer chip nestled inside. “Is this what my parents need?”

“Yes, but it isn’t all they need, and someone will have noticed the inventory discrepancy by the time we return. If we don’t have Markus with us at that time…”

Exhaling a heavy breath, Alice closes the case. “I’ll figure something out.”

Chloe’s eyes remain on the road as she tightens her hands around the steering wheel. “I really hope you do.”

* * *

The rusty and crumbling shipwreck of Jericho is less imposing the second time. Alice takes a deep breath as she walks onto the deck alone, Chloe waiting for her with the truck on the pier, and follows the same path she took earlier.

Markus is exactly where she last saw him, like a fly caught at the center of a web made of wires and cables.

He blinks at her, brow furrowed. “You’re back. I didn’t expect you to come back.”

“I didn’t expect to be back.”

Alice nudges cables out of her way with her boot before sitting down on the rusty metal floor across from Markus. His luminescent eye latches onto her, steady and present.

“Why do you stay in here?” she asks. If she’ll have any hope of convincing him to leave, she needs to understand.

The slow blink of Markus’ eyes makes the light emanating from the blue one shimmer in the darkness. At first, he only looks at Alice, processor pulsing like lazy fireflies.

She has to stop herself from asking how long it has been since he had company—physical company. How long it has been since anyone asked him to explain any of this.

“I feel like I should,” Markus says eventually.

It’s a simple answer, but it carries weight, given who Markus is and what happened fifteen years ago. Alice has seen reporters and politicians alike dissect everything that happened in November of 2038, and many say that the raid on Jericho was the beginning of the end, the moment the revolution took a turn for the volatile. The moment that spurred Markus into making the choice he did.

Alice hugs her arms around herself. The suit is thick enough to insulate against the cold as much as the radiation, but she feels cold all the same. “No one’s saying you have to. No one wants you rotting away down here.”

Markus tips his head to the side, eyes on some internally projected ghost, a person from his past—advisor, or friend.

“Many died here,” he says, still looking away. “Many died in the city. Humans and androids. Why should I get to continue after—”

He falls silent, but Alice can fill in the blanks. “People die, Markus. They die in a lot of ways. There isn’t a reason for it, it just happens, whether they deserve it or not.” She thinks of Rose’s house, the two androids hidden in the laundry room. Kara let her stay, let her see—she knew Alice needed to see. “It can’t always be… gentle, or poetic, or fair. You can’t make comparisons or tallies; you just have to live until your time comes.”

Again, there’s silence as Markus mulls over her words. He draws a knee up to his chest, resting a tattered arm on top. “Bleak, isn’t it?”

Alice smiles, so softly she knows Markus won’t be able to see it behind the air filtration unit of her helmet. “I guess so. That’s why you need to make it count.”

“Mm,” he intones. Turning his head to the other side, he seeks out another mirage. “What do you think?”

He isn’t talking to her. Alice watches him fix his eyes on the darkness, intent.

“I know,” Markus says with exasperation, rolling his eyes. In a different situation, it would amuse Alice to see someone like Markus—poised, commanding—making such a gesture. “But what other options do I have?”

As much as Alice wants to interject, she remains still and quiet, letting Markus play out whatever he’s working through. Markus still sounds hopeless, but somehow, this feels like progress, a dialogue set into motion.

Markus sets his eyes down on the ground beside him, following the lines of cables. “I can’t. I wasn’t what they needed me to be.”

Now, Alice does interrupt. “Hey.”

Dual-coloured eyes lift to meet her own, heavy-lidded and dim. Alice reaches out a hand, settling it on Markus’s knee. “You know I can’t tell you you’re wrong. I’m not going to make excuses for you.”

Steadily, some lucidity returns to Markus’ expression. He nods for her to go on.

“Free will means making mistakes, sometimes horrible ones. Humans have done atrocious things to each other, over and over, in so many ways. Staying here until you waste away isn’t going to make up for any of it.”

Markus doesn’t look convinced, but he doesn’t shy away from the harsh reality either. “So many are dead because of me,” he says.

“And so many more are still out there trying to survive,” Alice counters, voice cracking with a swell of emotion as she thinks of her parents, far away from here and degrading further with each year that passes. “You’re picking ruins over the living. Your guilt is meaningless if you don’t do something about it.”

Not even Markus, one of the most advanced androids Alice knows of—barring whatever upgrades androidkind has developed in the past decade and a half—can predict what will come of all this, whether there’s a resolution that doesn’t involve even more hatred and death.

She adds, “You know what will happen if you do nothing. Any alternative is better.”

Exhaling a long breath, Markus’ body sags, metal joints grinding and cables drooping to the floor. When he goes quiet, it feels enduring rather than a momentary pause. If he has been down here for years, he isn’t going to change his path without some deliberation.

Alice shoulders out of her backpack and removes the computer chip case Chloe gave her. “I have an upgrade for you. Do you mind if I help you with it and get you a little patched up while you think?”

Markus eyes it blankly, neither interested nor wary. “What does it involve?”

“Chloe didn’t say,” Alice admits. “If I had to guess: storage space, optimization, software patches for errors caused by time and radiation.”

Dropping Chloe’s name does the trick; Markus gives a small nod. “You have tech experience?”

“My parents are androids,” Alice answers. She shuffles closer, settling in next to Markus and gesturing for him to turn his head so she can see the port at his nape.

He obliges, then goes quiet, slipping back into thought. As Alice lifts the chip to the back of his neck, she watches the blinking of his processor working in the darkness, an indication of everything going on below the surface even as Markus’ face remains passive.

Once the chip is clicked into place, Alice gets to her feet to look at the consoles Markus has hooked himself into, using their power and space to keep himself running and holding onto the pieces of lost friends.

It allows her to see into his system in turn, allows her to see how the upgrades are progressing, how his system is faring. For a time, they’re silent, Alice moving back and forth between the console and the wires flowing from Markus’ chassis, doing what she can to safely unhook him without loss of data.

Markus is the first to speak again—Alice is so entrenched in her work that it makes her startle.

“Do you hate us, Alice?” he asks. “Is your love for your parents enough that you can look past what we—what I—did?”

Alice takes a deep breath, lets it out slow. “No… and no. I can’t look past it, but I can understand, I can forgive, I can hope for something better. Others won’t be capable of that, but I think it’s better to try, even if you’re turned down, than seemingly stand by your choices.”

The rest of the world doesn’t know that Markus has exiled himself to a decrepit ship like self-imposed punishment for his crimes. They don’t know that North is the leader of the androids now, don’t know how either of them truly feels about what part they played in it. Markus will have to amend that.

“You have a measured way of approaching matters such as these,” Markus comments.

Alice makes a faint noise of acknowledgement as she pulls a cable out of his arm, pinching his thirium wire at the end until she can reconnect everything properly, much like she does when she’s replenishing her parents’ reserves.

“I’ve seen a lot. I’ve had time to work through most of it.”

“They’re lucky to have you.”

Alice sets the loose cable to the side. The panel in Markus’ arm has been open for so long that it’s stuck in place, eroded and warped. “I’m lucky to have them.”

Finished with her work, Alice drops her hands to her lap, looking Markus over now that he’s untangled, more like the android Alice remembers from that first broadcast out of Stratford Tower.

“So,” Alice says, “will you come back with me? North still hopes you’ll rejoin her.”

Markus brings his hands together, running the pads of his fingers across his opposite knuckles. “I shouldn’t have abandoned her to this.”

That’s up to them to sort out. Alice pushes herself to her feet and offers Markus her hand. “Well?”

It takes only a couple of seconds for Markus to reach up and accept it.

He stumbles before he has made it completely upright, one knee buckling with a creak. Alice catches him with an arm around his back, pulling him in to lean his weight on her.

“That knee never did feel right after the graveyard,” Markus mutters.

Alice doesn’t know what he means, but it isn’t important. “Will you be able to walk with my help?”

“It won’t be a problem.”

As unconvinced as she is, Alice just nods and tightens her grip on him, helping him step over the snaking cables strewn across the floor. Shadows dance across the room as they progress through it, Markus’ processor and blue eye shining over every close surface.

They make it through the ship at a slow, shambling pace. Markus’ leg gives out a couple more times, forcing them to stop so he can readjust, but they make it.

On the pier, Chloe throws her arms around Markus in a crushing hug. When she pulls away, her expression is tight with emotion and her hands linger like she wants to reel him back in but she’s forcing herself to stay composed.

“We missed you,” she says, hushed.

“Me too,” Markus whispers. “I’m sorry.”

Chloe nods, then helps Alice lead him to the truck, up into the passenger seat. Alice takes the back again, not minding the chance to look over the city now that some androids are milling about in the streets.

There’s a shift, when they make it to the checkpoints on the bridge to Belle Isle.

They get stopped at the first—the android who steps up to Markus’ window is no one Alice recognizes, but she can easily read the look of shock they wear as they take in the sight of the revolution’s former leader.

After a moment of awe hangs in the air between them, the android finally snaps back to attention and sends them forward along the bridge.

North and Connor are waiting for them in front of the tower with a team of others at their backs, North looking like a battle commander with a stern expression and an imposing stance, Connor with a rifle in hand.

They expect trouble.

Once Chloe pulls the truck to a stop, Alice vaults out of the back and raises a placating hand at North before pulling the door open for Markus.

The storm in North’s eyes remains until Alice and Chloe have helped Markus forward, bringing him to stand in front of her.

“When you came back on the network, I—” North starts, shaking her head in disbelief. A second later, she sharpens again. “It has been _years_ , you bastard!”

Then she’s crumbling, the fight leaving her in an instant as she and Markus collide.

Alice pulls away, as does Chloe, letting North be all the stability Markus needs.

They press their foreheads together, skin melting away where they make contact. Their hands connect, palms meeting and fingers tangling.

“I know,” Markus murmurs, “I know, I’m sorry.”

The rest of the words they share are silent, private. Alice watches their hardware flash and blink brilliant blue, their chassis plates glowing white.

Calm settles over the surrounding group. Connor gives a wordless order, causing the team of other androids to disperse. Prompted by the stir behind them, both North and Markus look to Connor, urging him to join the reunion.

Alice moves to lean against the front bumper of the truck, lowering her eyes to let them have this with fewer prying eyes.

This is exactly what she’d hoped for. A reunited leadership, a stroke of hope, proof that all she wants is to help her parents.

In time, the group finally separates, but not completely—Markus keeps one hand clasped to North’s and the other on Connor’s shoulder, North keeps her free arm around Connor’s waist.

It’s another minute before North finally turns away to address Alice.

“Alright,” she says. “I’ll sign off on the release of two upgrade packs. Don’t make me regret this.”

Relief soars through Alice’s body, tension bleeding out of her muscles. She pushes herself off the truck’s bumper, straightening. “I won’t.”

She doesn’t thank North, doesn’t think North would appreciate her doing so.

Lights strobe within North’s skull. “It’s finished. R&D can take it from here. Chloe, can you show her the way?”

“I’ll take you downstairs,” Chloe says. There’s a smile on her face and her tone is bright, happier than Alice has seen her. “We’ll get you everything you need.”

* * *

The next time Alice walks across the atrium of CyberLife Tower, it’s with a spring in her step and a backpack full of supplies. An array of items and materials to keep her parents going for years to come.

She and Chloe leave the building in light, companionable silence, returning to the truck. North, Markus, and Connor have all disappeared into the tower together.

Once Chloe is behind the wheel and pulling onto the bridge, Alice says, “There’s one other place I wouldn’t mind seeing before I leave the city.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, if it’s still standing… a place in north Corktown.”

Just speaking the name of the neighbourhood instills an uneasy feeling in Alice’s stomach. Her heart beats harder, making her feel like her entire upper body is pulsing, and there’s an old fight or flight response ready to trigger at the slightest suggestion of danger.

But she isn’t in danger, hasn’t been in that kind of danger for years. It has been a long time since she thought of her childhood in Detroit, of the days before Kara, before the revolution, before the explosion. Most of the time, it’s fully behind her, a chapter of her life that is closed. Sometimes, she’ll remember little snapshots of yelling, and pain, and fear. Will remember hiding in her little blanket fort, clinging to her fox toy, hoping not to hear heavy footsteps thundering down the hallway to her room.

“Are you sure?” Chloe asks. Her voice sounds far away, muffled as if underwater.

Alice isn’t sure. Maybe visiting that place will only further reopen the wound, but she can’t stow her curiosity. “Yeah. 4203 Harrison Street.”

“Okay.”

They drive in silence. Alice rests her head against the door window and counts her breaths, the elevated heat of her body making the visor of her helmet start to fog.

North Corktown was always on the rough side, always had abandoned houses, but fifteen years have only exacerbated the lifelessness of the neighbourhood, leaving dreary husks instead of homes, overgrown by vegetation and untouched by humanity.

The streets start to look familiar. Before long, Alice can almost imagine that it’s Todd in the driver’s seat next to her. She sits up, leaning back in her seat so that Chloe is in her peripheral, a far cry from the man who made her youth a battlefield.

Chloe pulls to a stop across the street from the house. “What are you looking to find here?” she asks.

“I don’t know. Nothing, I guess. I just want to see it.”

Alice pushes the door open, leaving her backpack in the footwell, and walks into the street.

Chloe is a silent shadow at her back as she takes the steps to the front door, which is still open from the night she and Kara rushed through it to catch a bus. The hinges squeak and grind, protesting against movement for the first time in years.

The inside is both familiar and not. The kitchen is ransacked, the cupboards emptied of any food that used to be stored in them, but the rest looks exactly the same. A red ice pipe lies empty on the coffee table, covered in a layer of dust.

Turning around, Alice approaches the stairs, halting with her boot on the first step. She grips the banister, glove creaking from the stretch of her fingers around old wood.

Chloe’s hand presses to her back, light instead of pushing. “Are you alright?”

Alice shakes her head, but takes another step. She isn’t a child anymore—Todd has no power over her. She is Kara and Luther’s daughter, and they raised her with love, raised her to feel safe.

She heads straight down the hallway, making no stops, until she comes to her bedroom.

The moment she looks inside, her eyes are drawn to the stain on the floor, so old it’s a rusty brown instead of red. It’s a sharp contrast to the rest of the room, pastel and childlike, all her old toys dusty and falling apart.

Knees weak, Alice drops down to the carpet, in the place where her life took a dramatic turn. Kara and Todd trading blows, heavy rain beating against the window panes, a gunshot.

Todd going still, no longer a threat. Kara taking her hand, pulling her away from the body, away from the house, never to look back.

There’s no harm in looking back now. This house is abandoned and decrepit, just like most of Detroit, a monument of another time. Its former owner is dead, just like every human who didn’t evacuate in time. He was dead long before that. Kara made sure he would never touch her again—he isn’t worth another second of recollection.

Alice takes a deep breath, then stands. It’s time to go home, back to her parents.

She squeezes past Chloe in the doorway and hurries down the stairs, no longer wanting to be within the house’s walls. It isn’t her cage anymore. Hasn’t been since she was nine years old.

In the truck, she says, “I’m ready to leave. I’m guessing you already know where my car is on the perimeter.”

“I’ll get you there,” Chloe answers.

* * *

Half an hour into the drive away from the city, long after her Geiger counter went green, Alice pulls her car over to the side of the quiet road, walks out onto the shoulder of dry grass, and removes her helmet.

She takes a deep breath, filling her lungs with fresh air. It comes back out shaky—she laughs, clutching the helmet against her sternum and trembling as the tension rolls out of her.

In a few hours, she’ll be home. The fruits of her labour are safely contained in the trunk of her car. She got what she set out for, and she made it back out alive.

Above her, stars shine in the clear sky. She made it.

* * *

The moment her key is in the lock, Alice hears footsteps from within the house. She smiles to herself as she pushes the door open and immediately comes face to face with both her parents.

Kara quickly has Alice’s face cupped in her hands, scanning her for signs of injury. When she finds none, she wraps her arms around Alice to pull her into a hug. Luther wraps his arms around both of them, hand cradling the back of Alice’s head.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Kara breathes. “That was dangerous, it was reckless—”

“I know, mom, I’m sorry.”

“Do not be,” Luther says, and Alice can hear the smile in his voice.

Kara squeezes her tighter. “You scared me.”

Alice’s throat tightens. “It’s okay, I’m here.”

She can feel the tremble of Kara’s hands against her back. This time, Alice doesn’t think it has anything to do with the breakdown of her old body, running on knock-off thirium.

Luther grasps both their shoulders. “Come, you must be exhausted.”

They all pull apart reluctantly. There are synthetic tears glistening in Kara’s eyes, the reserves of fluid too depleted to overflow. Alice takes her hand, staying close to her side as they go into the living room.

With her parents on either side of her, Alice sits in the middle of the couch and places her backpack on the floor between her feet. “Everything went well,” she says. “I _am_ sorry for worrying you, but I’m not sorry for doing what I could to keep you both safe.”

Luther chuckles, a warm sound. “You get that from your mother.”

Kara softens, shoulders dropping. She runs her fingers through Alice’s ponytail, hand steadier. “I could never be mad at you for doing what you believe is right, however dangerous.”

“I know,” Alice says, smiling at her.

She unzips her bag and pulls out all the equipment Chloe sent her home with, setting each in a line across the coffee table. Two square, metal cases that house upgraded thirium pumps. A pair of electronic chips with software upgrades and a gateway back to the Detroit servers to receive future patches. Several pouches of genuine thirium made from the original formula, which Alice now possesses, along with a series of blueprints she can use if she ever needs to rebuild parts from scratch.

Lifting her eyes from the table, she takes in the sight of her parents looking surprised—and relieved. “Both of you are going to be alright.”

Kara wraps her arms around her again, pulling her sideways into her chest and kissing her temple. “I’m grateful for every second I have left with you. With both of you.”

“Me too,” Alice whispers into her mother’s collarbone.

She wants to see her parents live a full life, wants to watch them dance together in the kitchen while they’re cleaning up, wants to hear her father hum and sing, wants to share her life with them, because without them, she wouldn’t have her life at all.

Detroit feels leagues away—both the version that was fifteen years ago and the version that was only hours ago. She will talk about what she experienced in the lost city eventually, but for now she holds Kara close, happy to be home.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!
> 
> come hang out at the [detroit: new era discord server](https://discord.gg/GqvNzUm).


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